Auburn physics alumnus making impact with Jupiter research
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Auburn alumnus Philip Valek is hard at work putting his physics doctorate to good use studying the mysteries of space.
Recently, Valek has been working on analyzing data provided by the Juno spacecraft that is orbiting Jupiter in his role as a staff scientist at the Southwest Research Institute, or SwRI, a private, not-for-profit research institute located in San Antonio.
“SwRI is comprised of 10 different technical divisions that cover a range of topics,” Valek said, who earned his doctorate from Auburn in 2001. “All of our work comes from doing research for outside sources, either private or government. I work in the Space Science and Engineering Division, where most of our work comes from NASA. As a researcher, I am expected to pursue my own work, which gives me freedom to pick what I want to do.”
Submitted by: Maria Gebhardt
